ALERT!!!!
DON’T FIGHT IT,
ITS BIGGER THAN BOTH OF US
2011 “Steampunk: tomorrow as it used to be” exhibition is underway!
Steampunk – Tomorrow as it Used to Be
If you do, here’s your chance to get in on the planning.
Via email, came this:
EuroSteamCon I
So here it is, the idea of a European Steampunk Convention. Since a lot of things are happening on the other side of the Atlantic and some decent events have taken place in Britain, it is about time something major happens in continental Europe. Thus far, conventions and meet-ups have only been local or country-based affairs. There are active steampunk scenes from Spain to France to the Low Countries to Germany to Poland, all of them have thus far existed in relative isolation.
Now it is time to change this. It is time we all got together somewhere. If people travel across the length and breadth of North America to attend a convention, so can we, and we have far less ground to cover.
Maybe there will be one location where we all meet up. Maybe the convention will take place in several places all over Europe connected by life video streams. I do not care what the final shape of the event will be as long as it connects the steampunks, dieselpunks and related scenes across Europe. If we manage to turn it into a 24 hour world-wide event, even better, but for now, the working title is:
EuroSteamCon I
Some of my closest friends in and outside the scene have already given me a thumbs up and pledged their support, among them the informal head of the Austrian Steampunks. Philippa Ballantine of Ministry of Peculiar Occurences fame has also signalled her interest in participating. Now we need to connect the scenes across Europe.
So, if you are interested in joining the crew and get this project on the road, get in touch. Everybody is welcome, the more, the merrier, the more diverse, the better. If you are a lonely steampunk somewhere in Transylvania, contact me and I will help you get to the event when it happens.This is for all of us. I also want to reach out to our Spanish and French friends, we know you are out there, but we seldom meet, online or offline, let’s change this. If you can contribute, if you are a musician, a DJ, a technician, if you know, own or have access to a great location, get in touch. Let us work together and create the first European Steampunk Convention!
This is the age of the ætherweb, we can reach more people with the click of a mouse than our Victorian ancestors could hope for reaching in a life time. Let us use our connections. Spread the word! Translate this message and share it with your friends!
And to all of you who know already have an idea how they can contribute, help out or actively participate in any way, contact me: webmaster@dailysteampunk.com
Join Tor.com for Steampunk Week, starting Monday and running through Friday, October 7th.
Please come and support our fellow steampunk bloggers as they take Tor through the ins-and-outs of our community: Margaret “Magpie” Killjoy, Lord Bobbins, Andrew Fogel, Captain Donna Ricci, Janus Zarate, Ekaterina Sedia, Kaja Foglio, Lee Ann Farruga, Fabio Fernandes, Simon J. Berman, John Coulthart, Nisi Shawl, Gina Gagliano, Jaymee Goh, Cat Rambo, John R. R. Leavitt, Tyson Ness, Jess Nevins, Mike Perschon, Glenn Freund, and Pablo “Mr. Saturday” Vazquez III.
Our forum’s very own k-9 has produced a beautiful Electrical Gaming Device out of an XBOX 360 console:
See the whole build on the forum
As those who follow our twitter feed are already aware, we had a planned outage recently that took quite a bit longer to complete than hoped.
The short version, for those interested:
Our host was very professional and worked hard to restore service lost as a result of these unfortunate events, and is working with us on compensation for the downtime.
My apologies for the extended outage; watch here and the Engine Room for updates in the near future that should limit the impact of future outages.
A new book, “A Strange Engine of War: The “Winan” Steam Gun & Maryland in the Civil War” is due to be released by historian John Lamb, through the Chesapeake Book Company.
Lamb, inthe book, states: ““Charles Dickinson, who was apparently a dancing instructor and gymnasium operator, went into partnership with Joslin and another investor. They built several versions of the device, and then sought a patent, but had a falling out when the patent came out in Joslin’s name only. “ Dickinson would go on to patent his own device, which would be steam driven, and after exhibiting the hand powered gun in the Midwest, he had a working prototype built in Boston, then took it to Baltimore, no doubt hoping to find buyers or investors, Lamb says. “In the great tradition of American snake oil and patent demonstrations, Dickinson invited Baltimore’s city council to a demonstration of the gun outside his home in February, 1861.”
More at Strange Engines
Andy Tibbetts of Portland, Oregon in the US is building a Steampunk pirate ship:
The C.S. Tere is a 100% custom-built steam punk pirate ship. She has a hand built steel frame encased in wood, driven by a 10 foot diameter hub-less front wheel and two steel wheels in the rear. The ship will be powered by a 3 cylinder engine which drives hydraulic pumps. Steering is rear wheel and occurs from the captains’ deck.
To this end, a Kickstarter project has been, well, kicked off. Check out the video:
[Tip of the tri-corner to BoingBoing]
A while back, during a sherry infused evening, I was happily sorting through my collection of railroad photos, interspersed with browsing through “Victory” from the Dr. Grorborts collection from Weta.. I was struck by a what i thought was an interest8ing revelation.. or was it the sherry? In any case.. I give you my ramblings on the styles of the classic Weta rayguns, and ask the question.. “Was Dr. Grorbort a railfan?”
On Friday 24 June, 2011, we will be moving servers to a much nicer neighborhood.
There will be down-time associated with this move, starting sometime after 12:30 GMT; the Blog will be in read-only mode, and the forum will be in maintenance mode. My plan is to complete the move in less than 24 hours, but it’s possible we won’t be back online entirely until the following Monday.
After the move is complete, visiting brassgoggles.co.uk URLs will redirect to brassgoggles.org URLs for up to two weeks, after which both will work the same way. You should continue to use brassgoggles.co.uk when entering URLs. This is needed because of how the Internet’s address-book scheme (DNS) works, and it’s the only reliable way to ensure that the transition is as smooth as possible.
During the move, status updates will be posted to http://twitter.com/brasstech.
Ladies and gentlemen… we’ve outgrown our server once again. But thanks to many generous souls, we have the funds to make a move.
This move will result in some — though hopefully minimal — interruption in service, and I encourage those interested in progress to follow @brasstech on Twitter for more detailed updates.
Over the US Memorial Day weekend, our new co-located server will be mounted in it’s home, and your humble admin will begin preparing that server to accept the Brass Goggles blog and forum. This new server is many times more powerful than our current “Virtual Private Server” machine: it is real, industrial-strength hardware. This upgrade will help with blog and forum performance, and pave the way for new features and capabilities.
Due to a very nice donation of time and equipment by one of our community who wishes to remain anonymous, the hardware only cost us $1100 US; however, our monthly cost is going up to $50/month; while this is cheap, all things considered, it’s more important than ever to support Brass Goggles financially if you’re able. Currently, we have funds to make the move and cover the next 3 months of operation. As always, I prefer to keep Brass Goggles an ad-free environment, and your donations make this possible.
Submit your links to submission at brassgoggles.co.uk
